"Well, sahib," said this one—and Steve saw he was no Bedouin—"do you not remember me?"
Steve scowled; a bullet wound is no aid to concentration.
"You look familiar—by Judas!—you are! Nureddin El Mekru!"
"I am honored! The sahib remembers!" Nureddin salaamed mockingly. "And you remember, no doubt, the occasion on which you made me a present of—this?"
The dark eyes shadowed with bitter menace and the shaykh indicated a thin white scar on the angle of his jaw.
"I remember," snarled Clarney, whom pain and anger did not tend to make docile. "It was in Somaliland, years ago. You were in the slave-trade then. A wretch of a nigger escaped from you and took refuge with me. You walked into my camp one night in your high-handed way, started a row and in the ensuing scrap you got a butcher-knife across your face. I wish I'd cut your lousy throat."
"You had your chance," answered the Arab. "Now the tables are turned."
"I thought your stamping-ground lay west," growled Clarney; "Yemen and the Somali country."
"I quit the slave-trade long ago," answered the shaykh. "It is an outworn game. I led a band of thieves in Yemen for a time; then again I was forced to change my location. I came here with a few faithful followers, and by Allah, those wild men nearly slit my throat at first. But I overcame their suspicions, and now I lead more men than have followed me in years.
"They whom you fought off yesterday were my men—scouts I had sent out ahead. My oasis lies far to the west. We have ridden for many days, for I was on my way to this very city. When my scouts rode in and told me of two wanderers, I did not alter my course, for I had business first in Beled-el-Djinn. We rode into the city from the west and saw your tracks in the sand. We followed them, and you were blind buffalo who heard not our coming."